187. NYERERE: A Leader to be Proud of

Posted by Eva Ulian October 29, 2009

187. NYERERE: A Leader to be Proud of

An elderly person with one of the Italian Volunteers

Our Missionary Priest

People do not consider themselves as poor, only those who have no family are poor

TANZANIA on the East coast between Kenya and Mozambique, is of all African States, the most fortunate; not because it does not share the same hardships as drought, lack of food and water but because it has not had to endure the worst of all plagues that afflict Africa, namely, civil war.

People always give a gift to visitors- this elderly person is giving the Volunteer an implement to dig the earth that he has made himself. In Tazania the men too work, not like in other parts where the women work so men can engage in warfare

It is not by chance or coincidence that this is so, but because one man, one great man willed it so. The man was the great African leader and the first Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere. He became Tanzania’s first President in 1964 and voluntarily resigning from that office in 1985 at the relatively young age of 63: thus showing that such is the system of democracy and that he was not one to hold on to power at all costs, even at the expense of the lives of their own people which is common practise among most African leaders nowadays.

Water is precious but this is how you are welcomed, by washing your hands

This is the well dug with the funds raised by our parishes

People try to live as near as possible to a water source

President Nyerere achieved the unity of his people by installing a way of life that was congenial to Africans, that of the ujamaa, or as we call it, the extended family- similar to what they had known as tribes, and would become a kind of village life based on social equals. However, unlike tribes, being each one separate from the other, therefore causing friction, Nyerere made it so that people could integrate in this social setting and become a unity, by imposing a national language, Swahili.

This is a school and church: The Stations of the Cross are painted on the wall above

The Top Class

School: The blackboard is a bark of wood, exercise books: the sand on the ground

However, coming to the West is to Africans coming to a dream world where all is obtained by magic. Little are they aware that just as insects cannot survive on a sterile floor of a palace, an immigrant has to find somewhere to live and that costs money- money that he does not have. He has to eat, clothe himself, travel, and that costs money, and he can only get money by working. But as work is scarce and in Italy, almost non-existent, thus, since he cannot insert himself legally in the capitalists rat race world, he ends up selling drugs, knocking old ladies over the head to steal their pensions, setting up prostitution markets... and so on... on to the way of perdition.

Baptism is made when older

Confirmation celebrations

Never mind if the church bell is the metal part of a car wheel

This the Africans must instil in their minds before leaving their country, where, by using the aid given to develop their land, there is a greater chance to feed and get fed and an infinitely much greater chance to love and be loved. As Nyerene said:

Games

“a nation which refuses to learn from foreign cultures is nothing but a nation of idiots and lunatics…[but] to learn from other cultures does not mean we should abandon our own.”

Games

Toys are home made

Therefore, by far better and noble thing to do is remain and develop one’s country; not having to surrender self-esteem, pride, honour, and honesty to moral squalor and the eventual prison cell in the West... A reminder, just in case this appears an exaggeration: one third of prisoners in Italy are mainly from Africa. Don't let this happen to your son.